Electrical stimulation has been applied to treat digestive disorders and control body weight. Such electrical stimulation includes delivering stimulation pulses to the organs or nerves of the gastrointestinal (GI) tract, such as the stomach or vagus nerves that regulate functions of the stomach. For example, to treat morbid obesity associated with compulsive overeating, electrical stimuli are delivered to the vagus nerves or the stomach to create a sensation of satiety (fullness). The stimulation results in loss of desire to eat in a patient with obesity associated with overeating. When the patient's natural biofeedback fails to properly regulate his or her eating behavior, the electrical stimulation may provide an effective feedback control that discourages consumption of food in excessive quantities.
Implantable medical systems have been used to deliver electrical stimulation to treat obesity. A typical implantable electrical stimulation system includes an implantable stimulator that delivers electrical stimulation pulses through a plurality of stimulation electrodes. Depending on the location of the target structure to be stimulated, the stimulation electrodes may be incorporated onto the implantable stimulator and/or connected to the implantable stimulator using one or more implantable leads. The procedure of device implantation involves a certain level of risk associated with factors including the degree of invasiveness and anatomical complexity of each desirable stimulation site. The desirable stimulation site may not be in or near a location with an anatomical structure allowing for easy implantation of the implantable stimulator and/or the lead(s). Therefore, given a desirable stimulation site for obesity control, there is a need to minimize the invasiveness of implanting a system that delivers stimuli to that stimulation site.